Tuesday, September 11, 2007

Playing card from Internet Weekly Report. Shorter Jonah Goldberg: Osama Bin Laden lives in a fantasy world where he creates his own reality, even though he's incompetent & can't pull off a successful attack. But I won't mention George Bush & his "reality-creating" incompetence. Oh, & if we pull out of Iraq, Bin Laden will really start to think he's a bad-ass, and might do something naughty.

Let's pull a quote just for the hell of it:

Many Democrats too have been grudgingly breaking from their base's otherworldly narrative of late, though they continue to insist that a "political solution" can be had in Iraq without a concomitant military one. Even the Sunni insurgents are coming to grips with the fact that Al Qaeda doesn't have Iraq'sbest interests at heart.

Ah, now the Democratic "base" has an "otherworldly narrative." Few narratives are more "otherworldly" (& rapidly changing) than that of Bush/Cheney/The Project for a New American Century. A brief recap:

• "Every ten years or so we have to throw some crappy little country against the wall to prove to the world that we mean business."

• "Saddam Hussein is a thug w/ WMDs who's terrorizing his own people."

• "We can't let the smoking gun be a mushroom cloud."

• "We'll bring democracy to Iraq, inspiring other nations and ushering in a new age of peace and prosperity."

• "We're fighting them there so we don't have to fight them here."

• "If we withdraw now, there'll be a bloodbath."

There are a few others, but they've mercifully slipped our mind. Jonah, could you remind us just who it is that has "a dizzying sense that they were living in a supernatural world, in which reality knelt before faith?"

And while you're explaining that (good luck) could you throw in an explanation of the "military solution" the United States is going to achieve in a sectarian civil war, in a "nation" that was a drawn up to maximize the power & influence of an imperial power (the United Kingdom)? By staying there in the line of fire like cops trying to stop a turf war between the Bloods & Crips? The "political" solution won't come until the Sunni & Shia are sick & tired of killing each other. And considering this particular schism has been going on for the last 1300 or so yrs., is that the new timetable for withdrawal?

If these fools will admit that the war portion of their sad little adventure has been over since late spring of 2003, and everything since has been an occupation, it might be easier for them to leave w/ the "honor" they continually babble about. Not they had any "honor" to begin w/.

Image of Qetesh for illustrative purposes only. From the commentariat @ Sadly, No!, we are reminded by Qetesh the Abyssinian (even as we watch MSNBC re-running the Today show of six years ago, w/ the whole mess) of a previous 11 September, in Chile. Let's go to Qetesh:

Finally, let’s not forget the other September 11th. I just wish that some idiots would realise that behaviour like the first leads to behaviour like the second.

She spells in that cute way because she's a cat, & lives in Australia.

Below, the last photo of Salvador Allende before his murder at the hands of fascist thugs supported & financed by the CIA, on the orders of Richard "Murderhous" Nixon & Henry "Killer" Kissinger.

09.10.07
GINGRICH: A LITTLE BIT KOOKY, A LITTLE BIT ... LIBERAL?: Newt Gingrich gave a speech at AEI this morning in which he presented an "alternative history" of the war on terror as he would have conducted it. The speech was vintage Newt, complete with bold new capitalization (Gingrich says at war with the Irreconcilable Wing of Islam), exciting-but-kooky ideas ("We should give every student in Iran a free cell phone"), and casual suggestions for huge new military operations (Blockade Iran! After all, "We have an entire Navy not currently occupied in Iraq.") Listening to the speech, though, what I found most interesting was that it also contained a fairly standard liberal critique of the way President Bush has conducted the war on terror. Gingrich faulted Bush for not dedicating enough resources to first responders, for not waging an aggressive public-diplomacy campaign to improve the U.S.'s standing in the world, and for maintaining a visa system that makes it all but impossible for many foreigners to visit or study here. He called for the creation of a "new Geneva Convention against terrorism" and a "Convention on Civilization, the Rule of Law and the Illegitimacy of Terrorism," which sounds a lot like John Edwards's proposed "Counterterorrism and Intelligence Treaty Organization." Gingrich also wants "a genuine Marshall Plan-scale effort to transform the poorest parts of the Islamic world." He even channeled David Broder, saying Bush should have "established an informal bipartisan advisory committee from the Congress which he met with every two weeks," which would have "enabled the President to get far more out of Congress with far less partisanship."

It was heartening to see that a more liberal narrative of the fight against terrorism has taken hold to such a degree that even the Newtster is repeating it--and also nice to be reminded why Gingrich never got closer to the presidency than third in the constitutional order of succession.
--Josh Patashnik posted 6:54 p.m

You are reading Just Another Blog (From L. A.)™, but let's go to New York, where, you might remember, six years ago today something happened that has resulted in our incompetent, foolish, so-called leaders sending us into a tailspin of aggression, death & destruction in the Middle East. And some of the equally incompetent fools who populate places like the Council on Foreign Relations and the American Enterprise Institute would like to make sure that we never pull out of that tailspin.
In the New York Times, Peter Bienart, a senior fellow at the CFR (and Editor-at-Large @ TNR) looks at a couple of books (one of them "drops" today like the load of crap it is) by two nitwits, one of whom is a CFR member. Things may be a little strained in the CFR lunchroom for a while.
The CFR member is Norman Podhoretz (also Editor-at-Large @ Commentary). His book is entitled “World War IV: The Long Struggle Against Islamofascism.” There's an article @ Commentary entitled "The Case for Bombing Iran" that pretty well sums up Mr. Podhoretz' general attitude. But let's see what Mr. Bienart has to say:

His new book [...] contains remarkably little information about its supposed subject. “Islamofascism,” for instance, goes largely undefined.

Here's how Mr. Podhoretz defines it in Commentary:

Like the cold war, as the military historian Eliot Cohen was the first to recognize, the one we are now in has ideological roots, pitting us against Islamofascism, yet another mutation of the totalitarian disease we defeated first in the shape of Nazism and fascism and then in the shape of Communism; it is global in scope; it is being fought with a variety of weapons, not all of them military; and it is likely to go on for decades.

Ah yes, the "totalitarian disease." Bienart again:

Podhoretz does call it a “monster with two heads, one religious and the other secular.” But if fascism involves worship of the state, how exactly does the religious “head” — Al Qaeda — qualify, given that Osama bin Laden sees the state as a pagan imposition threatening the unity of Islam? And if the secular “head” was Saddam Hussein’s Baath Party, what made it Islamofascist?[...]What really interests Podhoretz, who now advises Rudolph Giuliani, isn’t the Islamic world; it’s the home front. The news media, he explains, are in favor of “an American defeat in Iraq.” So are the former national security advisers Zbigniew Brzezinski and Brent Scowcroft. Why do these ostensibly patriotic Americans want to see their nation humiliated and its troops killed? Because it will help their careers. Many Realists ... along with most liberal internationalists,” he writes, “were rooting for an American defeat as the only way to save their worldview from winding up on the ash heap of history.” And thus, Podhoretz lays the foundation for claiming — if America loses in Iraq — that we were stabbed in the back. Which, as Theodore Draper noted 25 years ago in a review of Podhoretz’s book “Why We Were in Vietnam,” is exactly what he did the last time America lost a major war.

The stab in the back narrative. Known to post World War I Germany as Dolchstoßlegende. Did somebody say "totalitarian disease?"
On to the next book:

Unlike Podhoretz, for whom “World War IV” is largely an excuse to insult his old foes on the left and titillate himself with fantasies of civic violence, Michael Ledeen has written an actual book on the Middle East. In particular, he is passionate about Iran. If Podhoretz is vague about whom exactly America is fighting, Ledeen is precise: everything traces back to Tehran.

He says Shiite Iran was largely behind Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, a man famous for his genocidal hatred of Shiites. He claims that “most” Iraqi insurgents are “under Iranian guidance and/or control,” not just Shiite warlords like Moktada al-Sadr, but Sunni militants as well — the very people who say they are fighting to prevent Iranian domination. In Ledeen’s view, in fact, Sunni-Shiite conflict — the very thing that most observers think is tearing Iraq apart — is largely a mirage, because Iran controls both sides. And Al Qaeda is a mirage too, a mere front for the regime in Tehran. “When you hear ‘Al Qaeda,’ ” Ledeen writes, “it’s probably wise to think ‘Iran.’ ” Not surprisingly, he thinks the mullahs were probably behind 9/11.
If this kind of statement sounds oddly familiar, it should. It’s the 2007 equivalent of the claims made in 2002 and 2003 about Iraq. The years between 9/11 and the Iraq war gave rise to a cottage industry — led by Ledeen’s colleague at the American Enterprise Institute, Laurie Mylroie — charging that Saddam Hussein was the hidden mastermind behind a decade of jihadist terror. While refuted by the 9/11 Commission and mainstream terror experts, these claims had a political effect. They offered cover for top Bush administration officials who were predisposed to believe Iraq represented the real terror threat.

Mr. Bienart wraps it all up:

One day, prominent conservatives will offer not merely new foreign policies for the post-Bush era, but a new style of foreign policy argument: lighter on character attacks and unsubstantiated generalizations, heavier on careful reasoning and empirical evidence. And when they do, they may find “World War IV” and “The Iranian Time Bomb” instructive, as object lessons in the kinds of books not to write.

For more poop on these two pants-wetting paranoiacs, click away. Norman Podhoretz. Michael Ledeen. Remember those names. If This Great Nation of Ours™ finds itself spinning faster & faster out of control, & about to smash itself into the ground, these two will be as responsible as any for an air disaster bigger than anything Osama Bin Laden could ever have imagined.
P. S.: Roger L. Simon, CEO of Pajamas Media, has also reviewed Podhoretz' book. We haven't read that review yet, but we'll link to it, and perhaps add more later. Bet it's amusingly stupid & ignorant though.

If you hate young & old people w/ an equal passion, you're probably middle-aged (a "Boomer) like Just Another Blog™. Not that we particularly like middle-aged people either. Here's another reason to despise the young:
You might want to enlarge this one to read the graphics.
NB: We already had the title before the admission @ the end. Thanks to The Militant Angeleño for posting it first. Give him a click.

Ummm. Teutonic beauty. Very attractive. Until you take a closer look. Or read:

NDR said Eva Herman, 48, was fired after confirming quotes printed by the newspaper Bild am Sonntag.She said "values like the family, children and motherhood, which were promoted in the Third Reich too, were later scrapped by the 68ers".

Sunday, September 9, 2007

Burt Prelutsky is a card-carrying member of the Angry Old White Guys Club referenced a few items down. You know, this & that, blah, blah, young people today, on & on. See, he is older & Caucasian: Here's a chunk from his most recent complaint:

In the past, compassion was extended to the elderly, the abused, the innocent and the infirm. But during the last few decades, it has become an entitlement demanded by members of various voting blocs. In short order, it has been transformed into political currency doled out by political hacks trolling for votes.

He seems to be whining about identity politics. Imagine that, a group complaining about their mistreatment as a group. The nerve! Oddly enough, he does mention the "elderly" (though we're sure he doesn't consider himself so, nor do we consider him so) as deserving of compassion. And a lucky thing for him, because:

As some of you may be aware, I am one of the 175 or so older writers involved in a class action lawsuit that accuses the movie studios, the TV networks and a number of Hollywood talent agencies, of engaging in the unlawful practice of ageism.

Burt, just shut up & take it. It's their industry, & they can run it any old way they want to. You aren't one of those "liberals, leftists, Socialists, progressives, Maoists, Castroites, Communists, and all the other whack-jobs on the wrong side of history" types you were just bitching about.

But back to compassion:

Frankly, I’m sick and tired of pretending that foreigners -- be they Islamic terrorists or Mexican nationals -- are somehow entitled to constitutional safeguards, not to mention a grab-bag of goodies unavailable to law-abiding American taxpayers.

We're not completely sure what that has to do w/ "compassion," but that was where he started. And frankly, we're sick and tired of people taking the position that "constitutional safeguards" (rights, Burt, rights) apply only to American citizens. Which constitutional amendment was that again? If we're not mistaken, the Constitution applies wherever the U. S. government is the sovereign authority, and is not limited to citizens of the United States. Maybe he'll take it a bit further & say that "safeguards" should only apply to American citizens who've not been accused of anything. Or maybe he could take 30 seconds to explain the "grab-bag of goodies unavailable to law-abiding American taxpayers." Is there a hidden super-secret Dep't. of Cool Stuff for Swarthy Furriners that no taxpayer can find out about, & if you did they'd have to kill you? Is there another gift-giving agency for law-abiding work permit-holding legal alien residents who pay taxes? Please tell us. We'll gladly renounce our citizenship if there's an entire grab-bag of goodies in it for us. After all, we may not have any constitutional safeguards left anyway. And what if there's an "Islamic terrorist" who's an American citizen? The courts will be tied up for years w/ that one. (See also: Jose Padilla case.)

Recently, I received an e-mail from a kindred soul. She wrote: “Like a lot of folks, I have a job that requires I pass a random urine test. That’s not a problem. What I do have a problem with is the distribution of my tax money to people who don’t have to pass a similar test. Why shouldn’t one have to pass a drug test in order to get a welfare check if I have to pass one in order to earn it for them?"

OK, can't blame Burt for the idiocy of his "kindred spirit." Just for publishing her. We can point out that the drug test she has to pass is not government mandated, but employer mandated. For all we know, she may operate heavy equipment. Let's hope it's not a job that requires rigorous logical abilities. She has to piss in a cup in order to support herself, not in order to pay taxes. Perhaps she wants any one receiving government aid to pass a morals test rather than a means test. People living in the decadent, free luxury of public housing can already be evicted for drug convictions. College loan applicants w/ drug convictions are denied federally-backed student loans, by federal law. Not enough. Certainly cameras & microphones in all public housing (even the private housing of aid recipients) would be an excellent idea. One of those dirty welfare bums might say something w/ which "kindred spirit" disagreed. Can't have her precious bodily fluidstaxes supporting that, can we? Electronic monitoring by ankle bracelet (no, let's put microchips under their skin) woldn't be a bad idea either. And on & on. Where did these people get the idea that government assistance is a paradise, and that every penny of their taxes...Oh. Reagan & his anecdotal approach to governing. That's right. Forgot, just like Ronnie did.

And now Burt wraps it all up & brings it on home. Remember, he writes for telebision (& letters to the editor) so logic isn't his strongest suit:

Not very compassionate, I grant you, in these days of unbridled political correctness. But it certainly sounds far more sensible than anything I’ve heard from our elected officials. One can only assume that when this sorry collection of senators and congressmen took their oath to uphold the U.S. Constitution, they all had their fingers crossed.

Please, Burt, we're trying very hard to make the connection between what you call "compassion," & urine tests for all, & the Constitution, and the legislative oath sworn w/ "fingers crossed," &...&...Oh, at this point we're just throwing good money after bad.

We tried to find the video (or even plain old text) of Michael Scheuer's CNN appearance yesterday, in which he put the lie to Bush's (& D'Souza's) "they hate us for our freedoms" & "decadent western life-styles" bullshit. Maybe it's available now, but who cares? You can get the same truth from CBS right here. Cover your ears, the advert (just like real telebision) is much louder than the programming.

Seeing the date atop the previous item, The Editor was reminded of the death of his father, 38 yrs. ago today. Died drunk driving (Well, drunk enough to cheat me out of $1,000.00 of insurance money, as he was committing a crime.) trying to pass someone on a curve near Yakima, Washington, two days after his mother's funeral. Grim, huh? The Editor thinks whoever who was coming the other way survived. (No digital photo available.)One other 9 September death: Mao Zedong, 1976.

Maggie Gyllenhaal modeling underwear for an underwear co. Who says they can't recreate the illusion of "Hollywood glamour?" All it takes is a turban, fake eyelashes & some drop earrings. Or a garter belt. Further flesh @ the underwear co.'s website.

Saturday, September 8, 2007

While researching the previous item we discovered that 5 September, as well as the b-day of Bob Newhart, D. Sidhe & Raquel Welch, is also the natal anniversary of Dweezil Zappa. (1969, if you must know.) Quite a date in history. And better late than never. (Though never better late.)

Der Gropenator carrying the remnants of the California Republican Party on his manly shoulder. The Cage-liner informs us that the political birthplace of such luminaries as Tricky Dick Nixon & Ronnie "When did the Alzheimer's disease start, and how could you tell, really?" Reagan, the California Republican Party, is doomed. (See also the previous item, where we mention the "collapse" of the "current version of the Republican Party." Talk about prescient!)

Groper-in-Chief Conan speaks:

Cautioning against an incipient "bunker mentality," he urged the party to follow the lead of Democrats and invite independents to vote in primaries. Otherwise, he said in a clear reference to the summer's prolonged budget standoff, the party will deteriorate to such an extent that "our only remaining power is to say no."

[...]

"The Republican Party should stick to its core principles," said Mark Zappa, 48, a promotional business owner from Gilroy who said he was "very disturbed" by the governor's call to open the Republican Party to independent voters as the Democrats do.

"If you have to sway your beliefs just to satisfy society, you don't have a moral basis," Zappa said. "Does that mean you'remarginalized? Possibly."

Just what does a "moral basis" have to do with a political party? Besides the obvious jokes, shouldn't a party's platform be based on policy, laws & programs to be enacted, & the like? If you want "morality," please check w/ your spiritual advisor, not some greedy power-crazed legislator.

To the best of Just Another Blog's™ knowledge, the principled but stubborn Mr. Zappa is not related (closely, anyway) to any better known Zappas.

"They want this party to do something more about climate change than simply doubt it," he said. "If it is the policy of the Republican Party to ignore the great majority of the world's scientists . . . then that is a party at odds with the future."

Schwarzenegger also said voters "want us to work for comprehensive healthcare, not stand in its way."

"We will be on the losing end of history unless we realize that healthcare must be addressed," he said.

But, but...the profits!! Who will think of the profits?

The state party's fortunes have dwindled of late. Its coffers are empty. Members have questioned the competence of party leadership after some dubious hiring decisions. California's Republican congressional delegation has been embarrassed by ethics investigations. And the number of registered Republicans in California has dropped by 370,000 since 2005.

There's a very good reason California Republican legislators have been known as "The Cavemen." Troglodytes is more like it.

Everything that America has produced in literature and music of enduring cultural value since the mid-20th century has come from Southerners who were raised in an environment that was still incompletely conquered by Yankee pragmatism. Whether our Southern bit of cultural residue will survive for much longer, and whether it can possibly do so without political separation from the American Empire, are questions that will probably be decided in the present rising generation.

One can respond to that only w/ a resounding "Say what?" and perhaps a request for an example or two of this fine Southern culture. Or a definition of "enduring cultural value."

alicublog also provides, by the mention of Daniel Larison & his invocation of "Patriarch Anthimus," a chance to direct our loyal following reader(s) to a TNR item about where the evangelicals &or fundies may be taking their toys when the current version of the Republican Party collapses (fingers crossed) & the less political among them find that megachurches, the "prosperity gospel," & hypocritical moralizing from the pulpit aren't cutting it for them either.

As Daniel Larison, a conservative writer and Orthodox convert who attends a Russian Orthodox Church in Chicago, says, "As a general rule, the sermons are going to be related to the gospel and that's about it. Political themes and political ideas don't come into sermons directly. That's not why people are there. They want to keep that as far away as possible."

A Modest Proposal from The Editor: We find out exactly what is involved in this "hard-wired for religious belief" mutation, round up all those cursed therewith (and who curse us w/ its manifestations) and send them to the afterlife they so anxiously await. Now. Starting w/ Pope HitlerYouth & the Archbishop of Canterbury and proceeding East through every patriarch, metropolitan, imam, ayatollah, mullah & Hindu muckety-muck, right across the Pacific where we get every pastor & his flock. And any other cults we've forgotten.

This seemed as good an opportunity as any to run this image: A commenter @ Jihad Watch, in response to the Bin Laden video:

I have no doubt he is in Iran. The Iran & Hezbollah complicity in 9/11 is now undeniable. Bin Laden has undoubtedly received medical care and safe haven inside Iran. It all comes down to Iran. But will our commander-in-chief gather courage to take it on? The only man among all presidential contenders is Rudy Giuliani. For the sake of this country and the world we desperately need him in the White House. Vote for Rudy and pray it is not too late.Ruslan Tokhchukov, EnragedSince1999.

Uh,...yeah, because a fanatic Sunni would be a perfect fit in a country run by fanatic Shi'a. That's why 15 of the 19 high-jackers were Iranian. They weren't? Well, that proves it then. Those Hizbullahs & Iranians are so devious.

P. S.: Ruslan, you think you're bad? Just Another Blog™ has been "enraged" since the early '60s. But we're still not crazy enough to vote for Rudy.

Bill Buckley salutes his troops following his loss in the 1965 NYC mayoral election. That would be William F. Buckley. Jr. From his syndicated column, Bill explains why Willard "Mittens" Romney is not a "flip-flopper."

We have to imagine that there were public men in the age we speak of who, giving thought to slavery, walked into an epiphany of the kind Gov. Romney claims to have walked into in the matter of abortion. Early utterances by Abraham Lincoln were ambiguous in the matter of slavery, and, of course, the principal draftsman of the Bill of Rights was a slave owner.

Isn’t it an obligation of some kind, in a society that yields to public discourse for judgments on the law, to permit a contender for high office to change his mind on basic issues without incurring the charge of hypocrite or opportunist?

Well, sure, if you're the Republican ex-governor of Massachusetts. Though perhaps not so much if you're a Democratic Senator from Massachusetts, and your epiphany puts you on a different side than Mr. Buckley.

Friday, September 7, 2007

It would be wise to read the "Intelligence response" & "Public response" to Bin laden's (successful) 2004 attempt to play the American electorate like a violin, from Wikipedia. Remember, this is the 2004 pre-election video.

Intelligence response:Ron Suskind noted that the CIA analysis of the video led them to the consensus view that the tape was designed strategically to help President Bush win reelection in 2004. Deputy CIA director John E. McLaughlin noted at one meeting, "Bin Laden certainly did a nice favor today for the President." Suskind quoted Jami Miscik, CIA deputy associate director for intelligence and Alan Premel former DCI Task Force supervisor, as saying "Certainly, he would want Bush to keep doing what he’s doing for a few more years." (Robert Parry, CIA:Osama Helped Bush in '04, Consortiumnews.com, July 4, 2006)

In today's exciting episode Bin Laden parrots some vaguely left-wing talking points & gets the right-wing's panties in a bunch. He also appeals to the "submit to religion & don't pay taxes" side of the proverbial aisle, as quoted by ABC News:

"To conclude," bin Laden says, "I invite you to embrace Islam." He goes on to say: "There are no taxes in Islam, but rather there is a limited Zakaat [alms] totaling 2.5 percent."

It has never been plausible to suggest that the war in Iraq is anything other than fundamental to our conflict with al Qaeda and related groups; after this video, any such suggestion is impossible.

You know it, dimbulb. Why, when Bin Laden mouths Bush's lines, we know how important it must be to stay in Iraq, so the rest of the Muhammadan world can see how we're not trying to grab all their oil in some giant crusade.

Couple of interesting notes: The suggestion to convert to Islam is a Qu'ranic requirement; you are given a chance to convert before they come after you. And the beard color? Hair dye is an Islamic no-no, except when getting ready to commit some jihad, when it's thought to have a psychological effect.

CNN gives us footage of the intro. Bin Laden's right, the most powerful nation on earth can't do shit to defend itself, because it's using a hammer to try to kill a fly, & all it's accomplishing is wrecking the living room. Anyone remember the Soviet Union? One of the reasons it's now the "former Soviet Union" is that it bankrupted itself & lost whatever confidence its people had in it trying to beat Bin Laden in Afghanistan. Now we're bogged down in Afghanistan & Iraq, and pouring billions into the money pit, as well as the lives, limbs, eyeballs & brains of American service people & contractors & many more Iraqis.

Thanks to Sadly, No! commenters bpower (for the Wikipedia link) paul (for the title idea) & John O for the violin reference. Actually, just click the S,N! link. The commentariat says all that needs to be said.

No actual video yet. No one has the guts to provide the URL of the Jihadi website where this thing is alleged to be.CBS2 New York reports no new threats from the"lion sheik."Here's one of MSNBC analyzing it.This is the first MSNBC report.And the NBC Nightly Newsreport, available here before you can see it (locally) on KNBC tonight @ 1830.

There's a guy in Oz by the name of Chas. (snappy name, that) who has an ABC TV show called The Chaser's War on Everything (The Editor wishes he'd thought of that, though he's not too sure about calling himself "The Chaser") who pulled a good one on "Australia's biggest security effort ever." Story & videos @ the ABC (that's Australian Broadcasting Company or Corporation, not the Disney outfit here in the U. S., dimbulbs) site. (It actually links to a story about another stunt The Chaser pulled, but it has all available links & videos, unlike the stories about the serious breach.)

Best part?

On Thursday, eight other members of the Chaser program and three hire car drivers were charged using new APEC powers for allegedly entering a restricted zone in real cars with Canadian flags.

Thursday, September 6, 2007

We had a shorter version of this a while ago. So while waiting for the new Bin Laden video to hit the Infobahn, let's take a peek at this from Slate. (Take note of Dr. P. referring to a remote control as an "automatic selector." He really is trapped in the 18th century.) And if we can't get the damn thing to embed, you may have to use the link.

OK, it didn't embed well enough to play w/in this item, but if you click on the empty frame it will at least play in a separate window, & you won't be sent all the way to Slate. (Speaks well for you, Slate. Really well. Perhaps it's this "Brightcove" outfit that seems to be hosting Slate's videos. Remind us to avoid them in the future. YouTube/Google were able to solve their embedding problems. How long will it take you?)

The Two Ronnies: Doofus & Goofus.

UPDATE (7 September 2007 @ 0345 PDT): Here's Dr. Ron, constitutionalist, w/ his 180º wrong take on that pesky ol' First Amendment. And the full version of the text mentioned in the second link. Here's a clue or two for you, Doc: Neither your nor my nor anyone else's taxes should pay for anything to do w/ religion. And if you're so fucking big on freedom & liberty, etc., why shouldn't we have a choice between bullshit hypocritical moralizing handed down from above, w/o recourse because it's been handed down from above, and putting our trust (such as it is, not our "faith") in a democratically elected, representative gov't.? Here's the big quote from the Doc, not original to him, but a common theme among the "no king but Jeezis" element:

Moral and civil individuals are largely governed by their own sense of right and wrong, and hence have little need for external government.

Got that? "External" government is for you moral weaklings who don't know how to "govern" yourselves, because you don't spend your spare time being lectured about an invisible man in the sky and how "He" wants you to live. So, to go along w/ that unchanging, written in fire on stone tablets Constitution of ours (the one that never mentions "god" or a "creator") we can assume that Dr. P. thinks laws need not apply to white male property holders who go to church.

Orcinus, as is their wont, go into extensive detail about the doctor & his supporters. If you want links to far Reich-wingnuttia, you got 'em.

And a tip of the chapeau to ChrisV82 (for the Lew Rockwell.com link) & Svlad Jelly (for the Orcinus link) both of them commenting @ alicublog, where the proprietor has some things to say about Wednesday's Fox News Channel Republican Q & A session.

Archie AndrewsThompson in his junior year, with classmate Betty Brewer. (Lawrence County Public Library)The L. A. Times report on Freddie Thompson, who officially, finally, threw his hat into the ring last night, on The Tonight Show, while avoiding Fox News' Republican Q & A session from New Hampshire (& also avoided some campaign finance reporting requirements by waiting until two days after Labor Day) has already been termed "must read" (at least by the guy who writes Today's Papers for Slate) so let's take a gander:

Freddie Dalton Thompson (Freddie was his legal name, appearing on birth and marriage certificates) was born in 1942 to a family less distinguished than the Lindseys. His grandparents had come off the farm to run a diner near the center of town. His father, Fletch, a used-car dealer, and mother, Ruth, a homemaker, had eighth-grade educations.

[...]

Though friends and family say they detected no racial animus in Fletch Thompson -- he had black customers during segregation, when other local businesses didn't -- he signed ads in local newspapers railing against communists and forced integration. An Oct. 21, 1968, newspaper ad signed by Fletch Thompson alone said: "Don't vote for George Wallace . . . if you believe you should let some long haired, atheistic Communist teach your child in college . . . if you believe you should have to bus your child all over the Country to balance the races. . . ."

Father and son remained close, but they disagreed politically that year. "Fred was definitely for Nixon," recalls Bill Crowder, chairman of the Nixon-Agnew campaign in Lawrence County. "He went to all the rallies with us."

From Pravda: "Stunning Photos of Pilots Ejecting From Fighter Jets." We've never heard the word "stunning" used for anything other than a "fabulous gown," but what do we know? When the Communist Party was running Pravda ("Truth," in Russian) it would never have run crap like this. But if you're jonesin' for the Weekly World News, Pravda may be the place to visit.

"Right now, I don't know what role it played, but the fact that he became more religious at the end did set off alarms in my head," said Nowinski. "I had heard that Chris placed Bibles next to the body. That actually did raise red flags in my head, because … a few of our prior cases had become very religious,where they had not been, at the end of their lives."

Also from Nightline, Chris Benoit's father:

"We certainly were aware, or have been made aware, of some issues that he was having, from some neighbors — of some strange behavior that was going on," Michael Benoit said. "He had started to wear a rosary around his neck … he wasn't all that religious a person."

A sudden shift toward spiritualty can be interpreted as the result of dementia.

We rest our case, religious types. You're drain-bamaged. Hard-wired for religion, our ass. Mis-wired for religion is more like it.

Internet buddy (from the world of commenting) D. Sidhe also celebrates today. Doghouse Riley apparently broke the news, World O' Crap picked it up. Well, maybe D. herself broke it, yesterday, but she just mentioned it in passing. We, as usual, are late to the proverbial party, but we like sleeping 'til 1400 every day! (When we looked @ Lady Insignificant yesterday the new post title was so similar to the previous one we didn't actually notice it was new.) Makes us wonder if it was yesterday, or if she just got presents early. Though she's got plenty on her mind, sounds like she's enjoying herself. Choc-o-lat-l, as the Aztecs or whoever pronounce it.

No, she's not a typing otter, but that's the only picture on her site. Quite the woman of mystery, no year available either, but it's really nobody else's beeswax. Many happy returns (Still don't know what that means. Returning your gifts for cash?) & hope all stays on an even keel, for a long time.

Not that The Editor believes a word of it, even if he is one, but Virgos is teh best! Edsels, On The Road, Peabody, Bob Newhart, Raquel Welch (And Sophia Loren, we think. Dating ourselves much?) only prove it.

Turns out Bob Newhart was born on this date as well as Rocky Welch & others. That makes him 78. Just Another Blog™ likes button-down shirts. It's part of our "Preppie Gone Wrong" persona. And we like Bob Newhart. He's funny. Yes, for any one under 45 or so he's too subtle (try paying attention for more than 30 seconds at a time, ADHD young people) but sometimes it's better if you have to work to get it.

The liberal wussbags @ the Federation of American Scientists are getting all nervous about a few nuclear weapons being flown across the U. S. On the right, B-61 A-Bombs loaded in a C-124. O. K., so they're usually secured in a cargo plane rather than loaded & ready to fire on a B-52. Whatever. Worrywarts.

More cheesecake. (Is that offensive & sexist? Or just silly &/or stupid?) Ms. Welch is 67 (!) today. Not sure when the shot on the right was taken, the one below was shot 363 days ago. Looking good either way. Hollywood idjits haven't cast her in anything since something called Forget About It, last year, but she's got a wig line going.

The protagonists of On The Road, Neal Cassady & Jack Kerouac. Laziness is its own reward. Just Another Blog™ can't remember if it ever read On The Road (pretty sure we started it once...) & now it's been 50 yrs. since its publication. The real laziness is not in not finishing it (or not) it's in linking to the Literary Giant of the Pacific Southwest, our own Los Angeles Times.

And something you probably won't find in the Times:

Kerouac Never Drove, So He Never Drove Alone

you're born alone, you die alone, you pull into a truck-stop in Gallup alone where every trucker looks like the devil. like pictures of the devil. like they'd kill you worse than cops or buy you a beer, two beers, if they knew what you were thinking. about their looking like the devil or killing you or buying you beers. but there's no beer at this stop, so it's only devil, killing...

—Richard Meltzer

(Typesetting not necessarily as intended by the author, but that's what happens w/ internet devil-boxes. —The Editor)

No sooner were we ready to put this issue (& ourself) to bed than this popped up on the Daily Mail site. Lily & Amy seem joined @ the hip, as far as attracting the attention of the Daily Mail, & here as well. Must've been quite a night in LDN town. Ah, to be young, silly/stupid & drunk again. Been there, done that, but w/o nearly enough money in our case.

Lily had clearly enjoyed the free bar, and things came to a head when megastar Madonna - who made a surprise appearance to present the Inspiration Award to her pal, interior designer David Collins - got up to make her speech.Rebel Lily didn't stop talking - extremely loudly - throughout the entire six minutes that Madge was on the mic. Feeling tipsy: Lily Allen proved a little unsteady on her feet.

Clearly Lily didn't have enough fun at the GQ awards, so she decided to gate-crash the private - and secret - afterparty of Keira Knightley's movie Atonement in Claridges Hotel.Lily was staying there last night and headed straight for the ballroom with her pal, TV presenter (and champion sourpuss)Miquita Oliver.The pair downed as many free drinks as they could find before deciding to cause havoc in the hotel, while a bemused Keira and boyfriend Rupert Friend looked on.And who should the naughty pair bump into again but Madonna and Guy Ritchie, who were also at the hotel, trying to enjoy a quiet drink in the bar.The sours said: “Madonna looked slightly disgusted and left shortly afterwards.” Badly behaved: hellraiser Lily Allen being told off for lighting up next to a ‘No Smoking’ sign. (Both photos & captions from Daily Mail.)

Tom Cruise (w/ eye patch) & other members of the Scientology High Council plot to dump your soul in a live volcano, or take you for all your money, or whatever the fuck it is that they want to do to you.

And that's good, because we can always take a cue from the British press (and a few pictures). So let's take a peep at Amy Winehouse, "one of the best voices of anybody of all time," according to Jools Holland (on left in photo @ right) who used to be in Squeeze (?) or something, and seems to have put on a stone or two since the photos for his website were taken. Our conclusion: If Ms. W. can stand up by herself, that's probably progress. Keep on keepin' on, girlfren'!!Amy enjoys the free alcohol at last night's Mercury Music Awards where her acoustic performance silenced the room. Her proud dad Mitch (far right) watched on. (Photo & caption: Daily Mail)

War plans may have already been drawn up. Bombs away! Check it out, dudes & dudettes!! Links plus àu-go-go!! It's one-stop shopping here. We'll start w/ a PDF of an ivory tower paper entitled: "Considering a war with Iran: A discussion paper on WMD in the Middle East." Don't feel obligated to read all (or any) of its 70 pp. (!) plus 10 pp. of footnotes. Do be aware of two sections: U. S. PREPARATIONS TO DESTROY THE IRANIAN STATE AS A REGIONAL POWER, & STRATEGIC COMMAND: GLOBAL STRIKE WITH NUCLEAR WEAPONS. Scared yet? therawstory summarizes it. Just Another Blog™ makes living in fear easier for you & yours.

A retired colonel w/ intel & special forces experience (according to his "About Me," anyway, we don't trust anyone any more) expresses the common sense opinion that the Grand Air Power Scheme won't be successful, but that won't stop them from trying it. Good comments there, too.

What if the American people and free people everywhere had come to recognize that since 9/11 the United States and its allies are engaged in a world war that pits civilization against terrorists and their state sponsors who wish to impose a new dark age? What would the world look like today? This speech will explore the development of, and describe, a war-winning strategy. This event is the beginning of a conversation to which everyone concerned about defending civilization and defeating evil is invited to contribute their ideas over the coming year.*

The speaker is the King of Alternate History, Newt Gingrich. Hey Newt, how 'bout an alternate history where you don't dump your cancer-stricken wife while she's in her hospital bed?

Iran has now taken its rightful place at the center of our debate on the war. Hardly a day goes by without new revelations about Iran’s penetration of Iraq either by supplying weapons, money, guidance, and intelligence to both Sunni and Shiite terrorists, or, in some cases, sending soldiers from the Quds Force--an elite unit within Iran’s Revolutionary Guard--to confront American and Iraqi forces. And in the background we hear the leitmotif of the Iranian nuclear program, which continues apace despite international sanctions and negotiations.

Are you quivering yet? Maybe this inside info will get you going. And from April (so long ago it's pre-Just Another Blog™) The Sunday Telegraph asks the question as well. Also from the Telegraph, the Bush speech to the VFW somewhere threatening "nuclear holocaust." Oh, not us, they're the threateners. Well, that's different.

And we just heard Joe Scarborough on Mighty Sorry No Body Cares rattling the anti-Iranian saber: "They'll have nuclear weapons in a year & will use them to decimate Americans &, uh Israel." Not an exact quote, but a close paraphrase. Joe really is just a piece of sub-human redneck shit, and, while an opportunistic dilrod, really too stupid to have any original thoughts, let alone reject the conventional wisdom.

Personally, The Editor can barely type any more, his hands are so shaky from fear of Iranian Al-Qaeda Muzzies who want to slaughter cute little bunnies. At last, America speaks w/ one voice: "Get the nukes out, our skivvies are wet!!!"

Another Daily Kos Diarist seems to have picked apart the Mystery LSO story. Turns out Diarist "Maccabee" removed the item. Is it a good idea to let just anybody w/ a valid e-mail acc't. start diaries, "web logs," whatever, under your name &/or masthead? No one publishes here except The Editor. And you're quite right, no one else wants to. (Hell, The Editor's getting a little bored w/ it. It's probably just the heat, though.)

One other anniversary to note today; thanks to both Franklin Avenue & The Militant Angeleno for reminding us. Though Just Another Blog (From L. A.)™ is located in West Hollywood, we're right on the border. We can see Los Angeles (Hollywood, really) all around us & do much of our consumption there. So Happy 226th B-Day, neighbor. The Militant has a video. It's too hot to go through the bother of embedding it here, give him a click.

If you think you can stomach it, Slate has excerpts from the new book on the Bush presidency hither & yon. One more to follow tomorrow. There's also a brief summary from "Britain's No. 1 quality newspaper website," Telegraph.co.uk. They said it, we didn't. Meat of the matter:

At a briefing at his Crawford ranch the day before the hurricane made landfall, Mr Bush was "gassed" after an 80-minute bike ride and asked no supplementary questions following a briefing from advisers. He merely assured them the federal government was prepared to help.

Does it seem that whenever the current president is at his Crawford "ranch" he thinks he's left all responsibility in Washington, D. C., that Cheney (or someone) has been handed the official reins, as when Bush was under the ether having his colon checked a few months back? Case in point: the infamous "Bin Laden Determined to Strike in U. S." Presidential Daily Briefing of 6 August 2001, to which Bush's response was alleged to be along the lines of: "OK, you've covered your ass." Or maybe his habit of "clearing brush" (or performing for a "brush clearing" photo op in an effort to appear Reaganesque) in his vacation month of August leaves him too "gassed" to grasp anything his handlers try to get through his thick, stubborn skull. Just Another Blog™ is advised that the typical Texas ranch or farm owner performs brush clearance in much cooler months. And by "performs brush clearance" we mean hires a bunch of "wetbacks" (as the colorful term goes) to do the job. Not that it makes any difference at the Bush spread. The place could be covered in shoulder high brush & it wouldn't matter at all. To the best of our knowledge, nothing is grown or raised there anyway, just an image cultivated. Dear Cowboy Leader is scared of horses, you know. And the ranch was purchased at the urging of Karl "Turdblossom" Rove, to make Bush look more Texan, and minimize his connection to the Northeastern power elites. Carlyle Group, anyone?

Does that all sound petty? Sure. But it's the little things that count, & that indicate what the larger picture is.

We've no idea of Edsel Ford's politics, though the apple doesn't fall far from the tree, but let's give him (on the left) a break. However, Charles Lindbergh (center) & Henry Ford (right) were two of Hitler's biggest fans here in the United Snakes. We go to the local fishwrapper again:

When Ford introduced the Edsel -- on Sept. 4, 1957 -- it was hailed as a car of the future. Named for Henry Ford's son Edsel, it offered powerful engines (including a 345-horsepower V8) and advanced technology, including push-button gear-shifting and self-adjusting brakes.

[...]

Despite generally positive reviews and a splashy launch campaign that featured Bing Crosby, Louis Armstrong and other icons of the era, the Edsel was a nonstarter with buyers.

Monday, September 3, 2007

Whatever. Just Another Blog's™ Editor hasn't done anything gainful in over a year, not that "Labour Day" has ever had any actual meaning in This Great Nation of Ours™. Every fucking day is Labour Day here in this shit-stuffed Nation of Sheep™. Baa, you stupid bastards!! If this were anything even resembling a free country, you fuckwits would have killed all of your bosses & feasted on their families long ago, but you all do is continue to bend over & spread 'em for massa's pin-dick. If we hadn't given up long ago, we'd end this by saying, "we surrender!!"

Sunday, September 2, 2007

FINAL DAMN UPDATE (4 September 2007 @ 2047) ON THIS MESS FOREVER: Click to be linked to it.Casual acquaintance, would-be cult leader & astrology-believer The Divine Mr. M. (it's the fucking internet, what do you expect?) is nonetheless pretty well clued in to that which is happening about us in the world of today (horror, pain, stupidity, ignorance) which is why Just Another Blog™ checks him (his site, really) frequently. And he's found a couple of beauts.

Let's start w/ the "legitimate" (i. e., Mainstream Old Media, this particular example part of Rupert Murdoch's News International Group) TIMESONLINE, which reveals the Pentagon's "three day blitz" plan for Iran:

Alexis Debat, director of terrorism and national security at the Nixon Center, said last week that US military planners were not preparing for “pinprick strikes” against Iran’s nuclear facilities. “They’re about taking out the entire Iranian military,” he said.

[...]

President George Bush intensified the rhetoric against Iran last week, accusing Tehran of putting the Middle East “under the shadow of a nuclear holocaust”. He warned that the US and its allies would confront Iran “before it is too late”.

One Washington source said the “temperature was rising” inside the administration.

[...]

According to one well placed source, Washington believes it would be prudent to use rapid, overwhelming force, should military action become necessary.

Israel, which has warned it will not allow Iran to acquire nuclear weapons, has made its own preparations for airstrikes and is said to be ready to attack if the Americans back down.

[...]

But Debat believes the Pentagon’s plans for military action involve the use of so much force that they are unlikely to be used and would seriously stretch resources in Afghanistan and Iraq.

A voice of reason there, perhaps.

Although we're anxious to see if any of that nuclear winter stuff will cool off Southern California.

But enough of think tank jagoffs & the Old Media. Let's jump right into the New Media, and a report from someone on the ground (or the flight deck) from Daily Kos Diarist "Maccabee": CENSORSHIPUPDATE (2 September 2007 @ 2045): If you tried the link you noticed that DK has taken it down. We'll leave the parts we took (regretting we didn't take the entire item, 'though we did get most of it) and remind readers that Just Another Blog (From L. A.)™ has never made any claim that anything written or linked to on this "web log" is anything but the rantings of one sorry individual, & links he or she has posted to other, unverified sites. And here's a pertinent link to DK, & one to the New Yorker blog mentioned. And one for the item that started it all. FINAL UPDATE: (4 September @ 0349) At last located the Google™ cache. We're just going to put the whole thing here, right below the photo of an LSO at work, no corrections to the original text. (Photo for illustrative purposes only.)

"We Are Going To Hit Iran. Bigtime"

by Maccabee

Sat Sep 01, 2007 at 03:50:24 PM PDT

I have a friend who is an LSO on a carrier attack group that is planning and staging a strike group deployment into the Gulf of Hormuz. (LSO: Landing Signal Officer- she directs carrier aircraft while landing) She told me we are going to attack Iran. She said that all the Air Operation Planning and Asset Tasking are finished. That means that all the targets have been chosen, prioritized, and tasked to specific aircraft, bases, carriers, missile cruisers and so forth.

I asked her why she is telling me this.

Her answer was really amazing.

Maccabee's diary :: ::

She started in the Marines and after 8 years her term was up. She had served on a smaller Marine carrier, and found out through a friend knew there was an opening for a junior grade LSO in a training position on a supercarrier. She used the reference and the information and applied for a transfer to the United States Naval. Since she had experience landing F-18Cs and Cobra Gunships, and an unblemished combat record, she was ratcheted into the job, successfully changing from the Marines to the Navy. Her role is still aligned with the Marines since she generally is assigned to liason with the Marine units deploying off her carrier group.

Like most Marines and former Marines, she is largely apolitical. The fact is, most Marines are trigger pullers and most trigger pullers could care less who the President is. They simply want to be the tip of the sword when it comes to defending the country. She voted once in her life and otherwise was always in some forward post on the water during election season.

Something is wrong with the Navy and the Marines in her view. Always ready to go in harms way, Marines rarely ever question unless it’s a matter of tactics or honor. But something seems awry. Junior and senior officers are starting to grumble, roll their eyes in the hallways. The strain of deployments is beginning to hit every jot and tittle of the Marines and it’s beginning to seep into the daily conversation of Marines and Naval officers in command decision.

"I know this will sound crazy coming from a Naval officer", she said. "But we’re all just waiting for this administration to end. Things that happen at the senior officer level seem more and more to happen outside of the purview of XOs and other officers who typically have a say-so in daily combat and flight operations. Today, orders just come down from the mountaintop and there’s no questioning. In fact, there is no discussing it. I have seen more than one senior commander disappear and then three weeks later we find out that he has been replaced. That’s really weird. It’s also really weird because everyone who has disappeared has questioned whether or not we should be staging a massive attack on Iran."

"We’re not stupid. Most of the members of the fleet read well enough to know what is going on world-wise. We also realize that anyone who has any doubts is in danger of having a long military career yanked out from under them. Keep in mind that most of the people I serve with are happy to be a part of the global war on terror. It’s just that the touch points are what we see since we are the ones out here who are supposedly implementing this grand strategy. But when you liason with administration officials who don’t know that Iranians don’t speak Arabic and have no idea what Iranians live like, then you start having second thoughts about whether these Administration officials are even competent."

I asked her about the attack, how limited and so forth.

"I don’t think it’s limited at all. We are shipping in and assigning every damn Tomahawk we have in inventory. I think this is going to be massive and sudden, like thousands of targets. I believe that no American will know when it happens until after it happens. And whatever the consequences, whatever the consequences, they will have to be lived with. I am sure if my father knew I was telling someone in a news organization that we were about to launch a supposedly secret attack that it would be treason. But something inside me tells me to tell it anyway."

I asked her why she was suddenly so cynical.

"I have become cynical only recently. I also don’t believe anyone will be able to stop this. Bush has become something of an Emperor. He will give the command, and cruise missiles will fly and aircraft will fly and people will die, and yet few of us here are really able to cobble together a great explanation of why this is a good idea. Of course many of us can give you the 4H Club lecture on democracy in the Mid East. But if you asked any of the flight officers whether they have a clear idea of what the goal of this strike is, your answer would sound like something out of a think tank policy paper. But it’s not like Kosovo or when we relieved the tsunami victims. There everyone could tell you in a sentence what we were here doing."

"That’s what’s missing. A real sense of purpose. What’s missing is the answer to what the hell are we doing out here threatening this country with all this power? Last night in the galley, an ensign asked what right do we have to tell a sovereign nation that they can’t build a nuke. I mean the table got EF Hutton quiet. Not so much because the man was asking a question that was off culture. But that he was asking a good question. In fact, the discussion actually followed afterwards topside where someone in our group had to smoke a cigarette. The discussion was intelligent but also in lowered voices. It’s like we aren’t allowed to ask the questions that we always ask before combat. It’s almost as if the average seaman or soldier is doing all the policy work."

She had to hang up. She left by telling me that she believes the attack is a done deal. "It’s only a matter of time before their orders come and they will be sent to station and told to go to Red Alert. She said they were already practicing traps, FARP and FAST." (Trapping is the cat of catching the tension wires when landing on the carrier, FARP is Fleet Air Combat Maneuvering Readiness Program- practice dogfighting- and FAST is Fleet Air Superiority Training).

She seemed lost. The first time in my life I have ever heard her sound off rhythm, or unsure of why she is doing something. She knows that there is something rotten in the Naval Command and she, like many of her associates are just hoping that the election brings in someone new, some new situation, or something.

"Yes. We're gong to hit Iran, bigtime. Whatever political discussion that are going in is window dressing and perhaps even a red herring. I see what's going on below deck here in the hangars and weapons bays. And I have a sick feeling about how it's all going to turn out."

We have two or three carrier groups in the Persian Gulf, plans drawn up, & no one, it seems, can stop George Bush from doing anything he wants, which has previously seemed to be running a business into the ground (How are Poppy & his powerful, wealthy friends going to bail you out of this one, Georgie?) or mocking those his state of Texas is about to execute. Truly, this person makes Richard M(otherfucking) Nixon looking like a well-adjusted, rational being. Worst president ever? He could grab the coveted Worst Person Ever Award from the hands of the current co-holders, A. Hitler & Joe Stalin, if he goes ahead w/ this. But as an American, Just Another Blog™ likes to see things blowing up & other people suffering ("shock & awe") so let's hope there's some swell footage!!

Thank you, & Gawd Bless America.

VERACITY UPDATE: The Editor has found a detail that may indeed indicate this is less than truthful: "Last night in the galley, an ensign asked what right do we have to tell a sovereign nation that they can’t build a nuke." In the navy, one eats in the "mess." (Dining hall to you landlubbers.) Meals are prepared in the "galley." (What you know as a "kitchen.") Unless these officers were pulling double duty as cooks, that is an inaccuracy. Not a huge one, & we doubt that "Maccabee" was transcribing this from a recording, but it does start to raise doubts.

VERACITY UPDATE II (4 September 2007 @ 0440): Now that we have the entire item before us, we can take a good look at the whole thing. "Maccabee" isn't an outstanding writer, doesn't know much about naval air ops, & may not have been working from a transcription or recording of the conversation, although the quotes attributed to his friend the LSO scan pretty well. Most of our questions are about the first paragraphs that "Maccabee" wrote. We know there's no such thing as a "Marine carrier." It's a Navy amphibious assault ship, even if only Marine ground-support aircraft fly from it. And only Marine Corps helicopters & AV-8 "Harriers" fly off the LHDs & LHAs, not "F-18Cs." Actually, according to the Navy website we consulted, FA-18E/F Super Hornets & FA-18C/D Hornets, fly from the CVNs. (The big or "super" carriers, landlubbers.) And we're not sure about the whole thing of transferring from the Marines to the Navy. One might think that if she was qualified, the Marines wouldn't want to lose her, but while Just Another Blog™ knows a little more about Navy ships &amp;amp;amp;amp; aircraft & Marine aircraft & their use than the average person, we don't know squat about BuPers & its Marine Corps equivalent. So, while we don't think much of "Maccabee's" writing, and do wonder if the alleged LSO said she was in the "galley," all other quibbles are w/ "Maccabee's" parts of the item. And we do wonder about being able to make a 'phone call (Cell 'phone? Satellite 'phone?) from a ship in a potential combat zone. Do look in the comments for a couple of notes from a commenter who seems to know his stuff, although we disagreed w/ his conclusions.

E-Z 4 U

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